What makes the volume of a transister radio, for eg., to go from loud to zero in less than 10 seconds or less, every time?

It’s a description I heard about it. It’s not dead batteries, they are on midway level. By the way it started out worse, it used to be on only for blink of an eye, and every time it did the same thing. and then it improved, to where when it goes to zero, you turn it off for say half an hour, you turn it on, the same thing (starts loud and in 10 or so seconds it’s zero volume). What is the problem since it’s not dead batteries?